21oct01

SOCORRO, N.M., Oct. 20, 2003 -- His Royal Highness The Prince Andrew, Duke of York, visited several New Mexico Tech research facilities today, including the mountaintop site of the university's soon-to-be-constructed Magdalena Ridge Observatory (MRO), located 16 miles west of Socorro atop the Magdalena Mountains.

(Left: Prince Andrew prepares to detonate a demonstration of a car bomb.)

The Duke of York's daylong tour of New Mexico Tech research centers also included viewing an afternoon explosives demonstration at a field testing site of the university's Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center (EMRTC), as well as a walk-through tour of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Array Operations Center. An estimated crowd of about 250 onlookers waved to the Duke and his entourage as they walked across the Tech campus to depart later in the afternoon.

While at the MRO site, on a 10,700-foot ridge of the Magdalena Mountains, the Duke of York, the second son of Queen Elizabeth II, also had an opportunity to talk with a group of Native American students from the nearby Alamo Navajo Community and Laguna Pueblo.